140 EVIDENCE OF MAN IN GUERNSEY. 



Fouque. The former, La Hougue Hatenai, was undoubtedly a 

 tumulus, for we have in the Lukis Museum a portion of a vase 

 of coarse pottery discovered in it during a partial excavation of 

 the mound by Mr. Lukis. We must regret that, when the 

 remainder of the tumulus was cleared away a few years ago to 

 make room for the Pumping Station of the Water Compan} r , no 

 one with a knowledge of archaeology kept an eye on the work. La 

 Hougue Fouque still remains, though seriously diminished in 

 size of late years. It is to be hoped that one day our Society 

 will take the advice given us by the members of the Societe 

 Jersiaise, when they visited it in 1915, and excavate it. These 

 are but two of many such tumuli once existing in Guernsey. 

 Our old place names bear witness to this. The old French 

 names for tumuli were Le Tertre, La Hure, Le Hurel, La 

 Hurette, Le Monceau, La Motte, La Hougue, &c. Turn to some 

 of the old Extentes of our Guernsey fiefs or even to our maps 

 and see how many of these names you will find scattered all 

 over the island. A cursory examination will give you Le Hurel, 

 Les Huriaux, La Hure, La Petite Hure, La Motte, all at St. 

 Martin's ; Le Hurel, St. Andrew's ; La Ronde Hure, Le Courtil 

 du Hurel and La Hougue Antan, on fief John de Gaillard, St. 

 Saviour's ; Les Hures, Le Hurel and La Hure de Lestac, on fief 

 Thomas Blondel, Torteval ; La Hure Corneille on fief des 

 Besoignes, Catel. These represent the gleanings of a very brief 

 search, a prolonged one would increase the number many 

 fold. The tumuli have all disappeared, having been levelled 

 in the course of agriculture, probably many years ago, but I 

 claim, and I think rightly, that these old place names are evidence 

 of their existence in modern times, and what is of greater 

 importance evidence of man's existence in Guernsey in more re- 

 mote periods. 0) During the latter period of the Early Iron Age, 

 tumuli were no longer erected over the dead, the stone graves of 

 the La Tene period having no external mark to locate them. Was 

 it the value of iron was such a temptation to the plunderer, that 

 the dead was hidden away with his treasures to ensure their 

 escaping thievish hands ? The many empty graves of the period 

 in Guernsey show even this care did not meet with great success. 



In conclusion, I think, the evidence of man's presence in 

 Guernsey during the Bronze and Early Iron Age is sufficient to 

 prove the occupation of the island by man from the Neolithic 

 Age onwards. True it is scanty, but glance for a moment over 

 what remains for the next thousand years, from the first to the 

 eleventh century A.D., before it is rejected on that account. 

 There is not a trace of a single building, hardly a trace of 

 pottery, beyond a few fragments of Roman vases. These and a 

 few Roman coins of the second and third centuries A.D., twenty- 

 one in all, are all that can be identified as belonging to this 

 period. Are we therefore to suppose Guernsey was uninhabited 



